


A Classic

by amirosebooks



Category: Almost Human
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-28
Updated: 2014-01-28
Packaged: 2018-01-10 10:02:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1158310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amirosebooks/pseuds/amirosebooks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for a friend when she was in need of some Almost Human / Jorian fluff.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Classic

The day before John and Dorian were in the middle of looking into an anonymous tip concerning the whereabouts of a suspect in a case. The tip said he was checked into a hotel in the midst of the mess of densely packed buildings near the black market doctor John had been visiting to help get his memories back.

Things went fine for a while. They found the hotel and after some unconventional persuasion techniques the manager let them search the suspect’s room. It wasn’t until they were walking away from the hotel, having found nothing of interest in the room, that everything went to hell.

John spotted their suspect in the crowd. He and Dorian separated in an attempt to catch the man by surprise and take him into custody without making a scene.

There were three people between John and the suspect when the man spotted him. The man winked before darting deeper into the crowd. John caught Dorian’s attention and motioned for him to try to get ahead of the suspect. Dorian nodded and they both took off.

As John ran, slipping between the shoppers and tourists and prostitutes, he kept his eyes pinned to the back of the suspect’s head and shoulders. His breath was steady even as he pushed his body to get closer and closer to the man he was chasing. Part of him wanted to look around to make sure Dorian had followed his instructions to get ahead of their suspect so they could box him in, but he shrugged off that idea almost immediately. He had no doubt Dorian would follow his lead.

Back in his apartment he fist clenched his cup of tea harder. He’d spent the ten-odd hours since the chase had ended trying to figure out what had gone wrong. The only conclusion he’d managed to come to was that he’d spent years in a coma. That his partner wasn’t human. That his leg was synthetic.

That was the only thing he could think of to explain why he’d suddenly forgotten all of Rudy’s warnings to treat his synthetic leg differently than his flesh one. Running was fine, but the synthetic leg wasn’t meant help him scale walls, hop fences and jump off of dumpsters onto the back of a suspect and then clatter to the ground as he tried to hold the suspect still.

Which is exactly what he’d done when he’d seen the man cut down the alley between a tattoo parlor specializing in synthetically-enhanced tattoos, ones that moved and glowed even on human skin, and a bar where you could choose between human and synthetic dancers to entertain you—for a price.

The suspect had caught sight of Dorian in front of him and had turned into the alley. He was fast, John had to give him that.

Instinctively, John ran into the rain-slick alley after the man. When the man grabbed the top of the fence and used it to heft himself over the other side.

John cursed under his breath.

When he reached the fence he found he wasn’t quite tall enough to reach the top of the fence like the suspect had, but he was able to grab hold of one of the support beams on the fence. He held onto the fence with one hand and quickly kicked out against the brick wall the fence was attached too. Once he had a semi-solid footing on the wall, he began to quickly walk his legs up the wall until he was able to reach the top of the fence. With a quick glance over the other side, he rolled himself onto a dumpster that was pressed against the fence.

He landed on his shoulder, sending a spike of pain through his arm. With gritted teeth, he rolled up into a crouch and spotted the suspect scrambling to keep his footing as he ran down the alley. From the cut on the man’s forehead and the crushed cardboard box, which was currently spilling scrapped electronic parts onto the asphalt, next to the fence, John guessed the man hadn’t been fortunate enough to land on the dumpster when he’d popped over the fence.

John smirked.

Then he launched himself at the man. He was able to grab the suspect as he fell. It wasn’t until he and the suspect were tussling on the ground, John’s arms wound around the suspect’s waist, that John remembered his leg was synthetic.

Which happened, unfortunately, about two seconds too late. When the two men rolled, leaving John’s right leg pressed against the ground as the suspect twisted in his arms and kicked out at him. His leg managed to get crushed or tweaked just enough to fail.

John was disconcerted when he realized the synthetic leg had detached from his stub and was lying loose in his pant leg.

Dorian rushed up to meet them a moment later. He immediately pulled the suspect off of John and had him restrained before a uniformed officer and her MX, who Dorian had called for backup after he and John had first spotted the suspect in the crowd, arrived to take the man into custody.

John watched surprise flash across Dorian’s features when he saw the awkward angle John’s right foot was resting in. John tried to fight Dorian when he offered to help him reattach his leg, but it was useless. Dorian managed to get it clicked into place before John had finished griping about useless the damn leg was.

Though the leg was securely attached, it refused to bend at any of its joints. John begrudgingly accepted Dorian’s help back to their patrol car. He was momentarily surprised when Dorian helped him into the passenger seat.

When Dorian slid behind the wheel and began to drive them back to the station, John couldn’t find it in himself to complain. His shoulder still burned from where he’d landed on the dumpster and his hip was beginning to ache from the way he’d hobbled back to the car. If he was honest, he would admit that his pride hurt the most.

Maldonado had taken one look at him, as he tried not to cling to Dorian’s steady arm as he hobbled into the station, and told him to go to Rudy to get his leg fixed.

Rudy had scolded him for ignoring his warning about how fragile the leg could be in certain situations. Then, after nearly an hour of watching Rudy tinker with his synthetic leg, Rudy declared that he would need a few days to finish.

John’s ears filled with white noise and he clenched his teeth as Rudy continued to explain something about missing parts and excessive damage to a control unit and shipping.

"How the hell am I supposed to walk, to do my  _job_  for three days without a damn leg?”

Rudy blinked at him. One of his eyes appeared larger than normal from the magnifying lens he wore. “I can fit you with a spare leg. It won’t be perfect and I can’t guarantee you’ll be able to work with it, but you should be able to walk and get around.” Rudy frowned. “Though you may need a cane as well.”

He wandered off further into his cluttered warehouse of parts and nicknacks before John could protest.

When Rudy returned he was carrying a leg. It was covered in a layer of brown-gray dust and didn’t appear to have the synthetic joints John was used to seeing on his leg.

Rudy lifted the leg to show it to John. He opened his mouth to begin speaking then his eyes darted to the leg in his hand. He fumbled for a moment and began swiping ineffectively at the dirt with the sleeve of his shirt. Eventually, he must have been satisfied that smudging the dust around was the same thing as giving it a spit-shine, because he held it up to John like he was five years old and it was a piece of macaroni artwork he’d made in school.

Dorian’s voice filtered into his thoughts from when he’d said that John wasn’t good with kids. John mentally cursed himself and took a deep, steadying breath. The least he could do was try not to yell at Rudy even though he could tell that the leg Rudy was holding up would be a disaster. The man was crazy, but John actually liked him.

"Here we go," Rudy began. "I didn’t have any other synthetic legs that would work for your height and weight. But I remembered I still had this in one of my storage rooms. It was my father’s."

John bit his tongue and reminded himself not to yell at the man. “Why does that leg look different?”

"Oh, well my father got this before synthetic legs were invented. He lost his leg in Iraq before I was born and never got used to synthetic parts."

Rudy shrugged like someone trying to make light of a painful story to draw attention away from it.

John remembered how his own father had clung to things from before the technology explosion as well.

Before he could get too caught up in that memory he cleared his throat. “So how does one of those work? Will it even attach to my leg?”

"With a few minor adjustments it should clip in like normal. As for how it works? It doesn’t bend, which is why you’ll likely need to use a cane, but it will support your weight and help you walk."

"Fine." John couldn’t bring himself to argue with the man and the faster he agreed the faster Rudy could get back to work on his synthetic leg and the sooner he’d get it back.

After they’d gotten it fitted John tried to head back to the station. Maldonado was waiting for him by the front door and she immediately pointed at the door.

"Go home. Rudy called me after you left. Take the next few days to relax."

Which was how John found himself sitting at his desk in his apartment the next day. He was restless enough to pace, but thanks to the fake leg, that managed to be even more of a nuisance than his synthetic one, it was too much of a hassle to walk on it enough to pace.

His doorbell buzzed.

John glared at the door. He contemplated ignoring it, but the buzzing continued. It moved from a simple, polite buzz to a simple tune. As if the person pressing the buzzer was playing him a song to get his attention.

It sounded suspiciously like an Elton John song.

After a few moments of fumbling with the cane and the fake leg he was able to get the door open.

Dorian stood smiling in his doorway.

"What do you want?" John asked. Then he frowned. "How do you know where I live?"

Dorian smiled. “Your address was in your file.” He lifted up a white plastic bag. “I brought noodles.”

"Why do you have noodles? You don’t eat."

Dorian shrugged. “I don’t eat, but you do. And Rudy mentioned how you’d probably be climbing the walls by now so I thought I’d bring you noodles. I assumed you wouldn’t be able to make it to your favorite noodle cart in your current condition.”

John rolled his eyes and waved Dorian inside.

Dorian’s eyes widened as he turned his head around, looking at John’s apartment like he was cataloging and analyzing each detail.

John frowned as he locked the door. He swiped the bag out of Dorian’s hands as he hobbled past. “Give me that.”

He caught Dorian’s smile widen out of the corner of his eye. But he made sure he was a few steps away, with his back to Dorian, before he let his own smile tug at his lips. The noodles smelled good.

Several minutes later, John was armed with a bowl of noodles and a cup of tea. Both of which Dorian took from his hands so he could use the cane while he walked. John narrowed his eyes and him and gestured for him to follow John to the couch.

Once they were settled John brought up the projection menu for his entertainment system. With a few swipes of his fingers he settled back into the couch and motioned for Dorian to hand over his food.

"Join me in watching a movie?"

"Sure. What movie?"

"Blade Runner," John said with a smile.

Dorian returned his smile. “A classic.”


End file.
